Peon's Place

Netflix has abandoned their Qwikster plans, and will now be on the Vizio tablet a few weeks after Hulu was added for additional movies & television streaming options. I had figured Netflix was already on the tablet as part of the original build, since the Vizio televisions with VIA (Vizio Internet Applications) all come pre-loaded. But now, it’s there.

However it’s too bad nearly everyone canceled their Netflix accounts due to the 60% price hike; and if you did keep Netflix around, I hope you’re enjoying fewer streaming options than you previously had.

Unfortunately, I’m one of those account cancelers. And to boot, they completely cleared my DVD and instant queues, leading to my decision to likely never come back.

I canceled my Netflix after their 60% rate hike last night – yesterday was the start of a new billing cycle, and that’s when my $10 became $16 (more like $17-something after tax).

So what if I like to get a DVD every few days? I can actually grab a newer movie that Netflix doesn’t place on their streaming service, and not have to deal with the stupid bandwidth ever-changing and making it look as if I’m watching a VHS tape from the 1970s.

I checked out the Hulu Plus service for the free trial week, and we ended up watching like 4 hours of Dog the Bounty Hunter. I’m considering not signing up for the monthly membership, simply due to Linda’s ability to watch some of the stupidest shows around, in a non-stop intelligence-lowering chain.

But since Hulu also has an app on my iPhone, and i have my new Vizio tablet, which is the only tablet with Hulu installed, is still worth having? We don’t have a cable television service at home; it’s streaming, or whatever movies we have stacked around.

What do you think? Do you subscribe to Hulu, or know people who enjoy paying for the service? I loved Hulu back when it was free, and I was single, with oodles of more time on my hands.

So I went out and purchased my first tablet — the Vizio that I’ve wanted since January. Benefits?

• Vizio kicks ass
• It’s the only tablet with Hulu installed
• It’s one of the lowest priced tablets available in the market

I’ll let any interested parties know how I like it, once I’ve played with it for a bit. I’m still awaiting the Vizio phone, hoping it’ll be 4G…

While I’m on the topic of Hulu,.. Yahoo, Google Inc, DirecTV and Amazon.com have all expressed interest in purchasing the company. The price will be going from $500 million all the way up to $2 billion, and the end of this week will give a substantially better outlook as to which company seems to be the one in charge.

How will all of this change the TV shows and everything else you love about Hulu? If Google wins, you can expect some sort of Hulu-YouTube merger in the future. That might have the potential for a poor, cluttered user experience. However, I can honestly say that it would be a better way to go than in the hands of Comcast, where Hulu currently resides.

I cannot find a better reason to cancel my Netflix plan and to go with Hulu Plus for a change.

Announced this week, my plan will go from $10 to $16. While you may scoff at the $6/month ($72/year) difference, you need to realize that it’s a 60% increase. If gas rose that high per gallon that quickly, you’d be outraged.

Netflix will no longer offer a $9.99 package of DVD-by-mail and unlimited streaming, the company said in a statement today. Instead, more than 23 million subscribers will pay $15.98 monthly beginning September 1st if they choose both options, or $7.99 for just one.

The company introduced a DVD-only plan for $7.99 on July 8 for new subscribers and extended that to current customers to reflect the costs of acquiring and delivering content digitally and by mail, Steve Swasey, a Netflix spokesman, said in an interview. Many customers want the option of streaming-only or DVD-only packages, he said. “We wouldn’t have charged this when the streaming catalog was still lean,” Swasey said. “The streaming catalog is robust to the point where a lot of people won’t want DVDs anymore.”  Read the rest of this entry » Netflix will soon charge ...

Amazon announced earlier that it’s allowing free movie streaming to its Amazon Prime members — those who pay $79 yearly for free 2-day shipping on qualified purchases. I mentioned last week on Redbox looking for a streaming partner. Do you think this is more or less likely the two hook up?

The initiative pits Amazon head-to-head with Netflix, which charges $7.99 a month for similarly unlimited streaming. The Amazon offering works out to $6.58 a month, and the shipping discounts remain the same. The discounts alone were enough to convince an estimated 4 million people to sign on to Amazon Prime, while Netflix has 20 million subscribers to its DVD and streaming business.

This means Amazon wins on price. However, their library is how large? As reported, 5000 movies and TV shows. Let’s compare that to Netflix, who now offers 11,563 streaming titles, including 1,587 TV show seasons and compilations, not episodes. If you want to be remove the ambiguity of TV shows and look at movies alone, that means they offer six times more titles than Amazon.

Also, Netflix has more hardware support. Everything that supports Amazon, also has Netflix built in. However Netflix also controls the gaming console network, with the Microsoft Xbox 360, Sony Playstation 3, and Ninteno Wii.; plus your Iphones / iPads / iPods, and plenty of internet-ready televisions and Bluray players with Netflix applications built in.

I’ve written articles about the enhancements of Hulu and Netflix a few times in the past (view a list!), so here are some updates for you guys.

With the reveal of its premium Hulu Plus service last month, video streaming site Hulu announced that it would be branching out to devices other than computers, including televisions, Apple devices, and game consoles. Today, Hulu Plus has finally landed on the Playstation 3 — although it isn’t available to all PS3 owners just yet — according to the official Playstation blog.

Currently, Hulu Plus is only available to a select group of Playstation Plus subscribers — Sony’s $50-a-year premium service. Any Playstation Plus subscriber can download the app, but they’ll need to request an invitation to the Hulu Plus preview period to use it. Once accepted, users just need to pay Hulu Plus’s $9.99 monthly fee to access it. Once the preview period is over in a few months, the app will open up to all Playstation 3 users — by which point it should also be available on Sony’s Bravia TVs, Blu-Ray players, and other web-connected devices.

Read the rest of this entry » Hulu Plus available only ...

Now that Hulu has vastly expanded its service beyond computers — to iPhone, iPad and other devices — and widened its content, does that portend bad omens for Netflix on demand? That’s a question that has digital-media analysts’ tongues wagging, so to speak. Though at least one analyst downgraded Netflix stock on the news, others contend increased interest in TV content online should pave the way for more demand on Netflix, too. ”It shouldn’t have much impact short-term, because Hulu is mainly a TV hub, while Netflix streaming is mainly for movies,” says Josh Bell, new-media analyst at market researcher Interpret. “It’s possible that even longer term, the two may be seen as complements to each other, rather than competitors.”

Gartner analyst Mike McGuire goes even further: “Hulu has movies, but it’s nowhere close to Netflix. It will be interesting to see if people pay for Hulu’s premium service, which runs ads with the TV shows. Plus, Netflix has streaming on computers, iPad and game players.” An iPhone app is in the works.

On Tuesday, online video site Hulu launched a paid-subscription service. For $9.99 a month, users of Hulu Plus can get episodes of Glee, The Office and other popular TV shows. And the service is available — for the first time (by invitation only for now) — on Apple’s iPhone and iPad, and some Samsung Blue-ray players and TVs through new applications. On deck: Availability on Sony’s PlayStation 3 and Microsoft’s Xbox. ”More wherever. More whenever. Than ever,” is Hulu’s new marketing slogan.

The 2-year-old company, which said it was profitable on more than $100 million in revenue last year, served up 1.2 billion videos to U.S. users in May, nearly triple from a year earlier. It is a distant second to Google’s 14.6 billion, according to market researcher Comscore. Netflix did not comment on the Hulu announcement. The publicly traded company reported $493.7 million in its recently first quarter, which ended March 31. Its quarterly profit was $32.3 million. Netflix has 14 million subscribers.

Say goodbye to your pricey cable TV! Between Hulu and Netflix, I really see no reason to keep Cable/Satellite TV around any longer.

Announced earlier today after months of speculation, Hulu Plus has finally become official. For $9.99 per month, subscribers will be able to watch their favorite shows — including those from seasons past — on a multitude of internet-connected devices.

Mobile devices are a go, with iOS devices including the iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPad, and iPod touch (3rd generation) being the main attraction at this point in time. The best part as far as mobile is concerned is that streaming will work on both Wi-Fi and 3G networks. Several internet-connected HDTVs and Blu-ray players from Samsung already have support for the streaming service, and later on in the year, both Sony and Vizio will introduce support in some of their sets ad Blu-ray players. The PlayStation 3 will support the service “soon”, while the Xbox 360 will play nice come 2011.

Hulu Plus will officially launch is July, but if you’re lucky you might just be able snag a preview invite.